The Waterstraut Waterspout: Summer Is Coming..

It's almost that time of year. The time of year every Floridian hates. When it's 100 degrees with 1000 percent humidity for MONTHS on end. Yes, I am forever grateful I don't have to deal with winter, but the longer I'm here, the worse the summers seem to get. (I by no means would ever move up north, though. We could get double what we paid for this house and move somewhere inexpensive and never have a mortgage again. But, as I tell Asa, I'd rather be poor in Florida than rich in Ohio).

May can get warm, but the humidity and the sun intensity isn't *quite* there yet. You can hit some nice days (albeit hot) where the humidity doesn't smack you in the face in June. But by July, those are all just a distant memory. Honestly, I think it's bothered me more since covid- because I haven't "gotten out of the greenhouse", aka gone on vacation OUT of the Florida summers for whats about to be three years. (For real guys, as much as I do not care for Ohio, I haven't been there in almost THREE years! That's a record).

Anyway, I tell you all this, not to complain, but to tell you I am taking advantage of the last nice days. Like, hard. This weekend was probably the last sub-90 degree weekend I will see until October, or maybe even November. So, I told Asa we need to go out and do lots of those outdoorsy things that just won't be as much fun in a matter of weeks. Picnics. Nature Trails. Bike Rides. The beach before the sand is too hot to walk on. Ice Cream before it immediately drips into a puddle. You know, all that stuff.

But before I get to those adventures, a shout out to Calib who super thoughtfully bought me an Air Fryer for Mother's Day (we've not had our typical Mother's Day celebration, but he did already give it to me). Anyway, I've been talking about getting one for awhile now, but I figured it might be a holiday purchase when they go on sale. Now, I know Calib has a vested interest in me cooking things in my air fryer, but still, what a nice thoughtful- and completely unexpected gift.

The first thing I made in it was a toasted Peanut Butter and Jelly (which was amazing), but I've made lots of other things in it too- potato chips, fried Reeses's Cups, Garlic Knots, and even some frozen food. Oh, bagel pizzas and eggrolls are good in there too. I'm still learning it, but it's awesome.

Then one day Hayden asked if I could make chocolate chip cookies. Now, I am not a baker. Anyone who knows me knows I am famously terrible at it. But, I told him I would give it a go. I have all the good stuff for it. A new oven. A good mixer. Silicone mats. Cooling racks. I made them in the regular oven and they weren't half bad. But, I've also made them in the air fryer and they were pretty good too (you guys, they even have nutella in them!

Thursday before Asa and I headed out, Hayden was working on school work (he's taking 6 week summer classes for English Comp and Oceanography) when he announced 'um, there's a crane in the backyard.'. Now, big cranes are everywhere around here. But, we NEVER have them in our backyard. Between all the trees and the fence, and all the houses around, it's just not really conducive to a crane stopping by.

Hayden and I were concerned he couldn't figure out how to get out of the backyard (and Dipper was losing it at the crane), so we decided we needed to help the crane see his way out. I went around front and propped open the gate, and then Hayden slowly followed behind the crane (with the giant squeegie in case of "emergency")

And then the crane made his way out, and headed to the front yard, where he stood for like 20 minutes squaking.

After the crane had made their way out, I realized my goldfish could have been in danger in my pond. I've had these guys for three years, at least. They were little 30 cent feeder fish. But two of them had grown to maybe 8 inches long and been in it for the long haul. I had a white one and orange one: Tom and Jerry as the boys named him. AND NOW MY WHITE ONE IS GONE! It had to be the crane. Asa said it was like an old man, making it to 98 just to go check the mail and get hit by a bus. I can't believe the crane ate it and then squaked in the front yard for like 20 minutes telling all his friends to come eat the other one. What an asshole crane.

I sent word to Peyton:

After that traumatizing morning, Asa and I headed out to Honeymooon Island. It's the beach we like to go to the most, but we've never been on any of the trails or up to the nature center. So we decided to do a bit exploring on the non-beachy parts of the island.

Our first stop was the nature/bird watching center, though we didn't really see anything other than some pelicans.

Off on one of the trails, we saw a couple of gopher tortoises..

And lots of birds and nests..

The trail, however, came to an abrupt dead end, because of a bald eagle nest up ahead.

You can see it way off in the tree out there, but apparently once it's spotted, they close off the whole area.

On our way back we spotted this bird with a fish in it's talons, and after the crane incident, it was just much too soon for me.

Without the loop of the trail, we walked back partly the same way we came from, and found the gopher tortoise still snacking.. overall it's a nice trail, but I probably won't be taking it in the summer, that's for sure.

Up at the beach, we put on our water shoes to go check out if we could find any fish or crabs up by the rocks.. though we came up pretty empty, probably thanks to the low tide.

But we did spot a couple of dolphins out in the water. Can you spot it?

There were actually two, but this is probably the best picture I got.

We spent some time in the water: another plus of this time of year the water doesn't quite feel like bathwater yet. That'll happen everywhere. Pools. Beaches. It'll barely be refreshing. But for now, we're still good.

Usually after the beach, we hit the Dunedin Sprayground. It's great for getting sand off, and there's usually someone selling snow cones. But, for the first time ever, we decided to go into Downtown. It's only a couple miles down the gulf from the Sprayground.

And apparently, we've been missing out on a lot of Dunedin. They have a tiny little taco stand that's housed in an old ATM building.

And the tacos are surprisingly delicious. Even the jackfruit one, and I'm not usually a jackfruit fan. The mango-pineapple sauce on top is awesome though.

But there are a ton of restaurants to choose from. We also stopped in this Jack Pallino's place because it was Happy Hour!

They had $6 old fashions (and the cherry in there was amazing!)

And half priced appetizers.

We went with the spinach and artichoke dip, meatballs, and mushrooms. They were all amazing, and we even had leftovers to bring home. Our total bill for everything barely topped $30. Plus, you know, tons of outdoor seating, which we love.

We kept walking down Main Street and found all these places we'll have to come back for. There is a lemonade/ice cream/pretzel place out of a caboose! A caboose people! It's adorable.

We nosed around some shops..

And then stopped in a little ice cream shop to split a cone. I got this brownie/peanut butter combo called "the boss" and it was amazing. The brownie in it was like gooey soft huge chunks of brownie. So good. I'd go all the way back to Dunedin just for that.

And then we made our way down to the end of the street, out onto a pier and watched the pelicans flying around for a bit.

I mean how is this for a random Thursday view?

We had an awesome day, and came home and told Calib and Hayden all about what they were missing (we totally invited them, but they passed).

Friday, Asa had to work until 1 for his Emerging Leader Training, and I had to run to Costco, and there was possible late-afternoon showers in the forecast. So I was trying to work around all that and figure out something we could go. We had gift cards and free stuff at Panera, so I suggested we grab some food and go about 10 minutes past Costco to Lettuce Lake Park. We used to go here sometimes when Asa still worked for Verizon, since it's basically right across the street from there. But, we hadn't been in years.

It rained a little on our way, but it was spotty and by the time we arrived at the park it wasn't wet or anything, so we found a spot under the trees (not too far from the picnic pavilion so if it started to rain we could run there), and spread out our blanket. When we opened are sandwiches we were shocked at the size. Someone new is working at Panera and they are giving you like double sandwiches with tons of meat on them. In today's world where you get less for more, I'm not complaining at all. (Though we've said next time we go, we're going to be real disappointed in serving sizes).

Besides the sandwiches, we got a spot near the gopher tortoise nest/tunnel/den whatever you call it.

I promise these pictures are zoomed in. I tried to keep my distance as to not disturb the Gopher Tortoise.

After lunch we headed over to the boardwalk and noted all the things that are different. The nature center has definitely gotten an upgrade, and this sign was new.

The boardwalk hasn't changed much, though it's always different depending on water levels.

A little more than halfway through the boardwalk, there's a three story tower to see the Hillsborough River. And we were lucky enough to see all kinds of gators, including a couple pretty close up.

There's two of them, spot them if you can.

I got some good pictures from the first floor..

And then we climbed the tower and got some good ones from above.

When the boardwalk ends, we took the trail back to the car and then ran our errands. We never did get rained on either!

For dinner, we grilled out. Because, summer is not really when you want to be grilling in Florida. It's already so hot and sticky, nobody wants to stand in front of a hot grill. And, it was nice enough, I even got everyone to eat outside!

On Saturday, Asa and I decided to take the big loop through Connerton on our bikes. We'll still bike ride in the summer, but it isn't nearly as pleasant.

Instead of packing a picnic, we finally stopped by A Cup of Organic at the Rose Cottage in Connerton. It's just a small breakfast/lunch sandwich and coffee shop, but we've always just kind of passed by.

It's super cute inside, too! So, this might be a keeper for summer bike rides- we could get an air conditioned sit down break!

We split a Cuban, which was pretty decent, especially for the price. Asa got an iced coffee, and I got an iced tea, which was a little too sweet for my liking.

We ate outside on the patio, which was lovely.

And then we continued on our bike ride. No big gators, but a couple of little ones.

We swung by Publix on the way home to pick up a few things, and they had hot dogs for charity, so Asa ate one of those.

And then when we got back, we hit the pool. The pool will also get less pleasant as summer drags on. It'll become bath water, and the ground will be so hot you'll have to wear your flip flops right up to the edge (and then flip them over so they don't burn your feet when you put them back on). But for now, it's awesome.

Later that afternoon, we ran out to get some All You Can Swirl.

And we stopped by Dunchins to see what they had, and there was a whole bunch of new succulents. Asa got me some for Mother's Day, because he usually does. But look how cute the flowering one is? I love it so much.

We also got a cactus for our neighbor as a graduation present. He graduated from USF last weekend, and had just showed me all his cactus's he was getting into, so we thought we'd give him one to add to his collection.

Plus, we were having Neighbor Night with him and his family that evening.

Basically we sit in our neighbors driveway, eat a bunch of food, have a bunch of random drinks, and talk way too loudly until way too late. And, it's super fun.

Sunday was pretty low key, and it was pretty hot, we got up to 92 I think. But Monday, Asa found time in his busy schedule to have a picnic lunch with me down at the pool.

I'm working on some new Minnie ears... can you tell?

Tuesday (today! Look at me being all caught up on stuff), Hayden had a ukulele lesson at the Starkey Ranch library, so I dropped him off, and then I took a loop around their nature trail (guys, check out my new visor... it's made out of a cooling towel, and it's amazing!)

It was a lovely walk, and helped me get my steps in. I stopped by the Starky Ranch Market, and then headed back to the library to nose around before he was all done. He really enjoyed it, so hopefully they do more classes like that.